1.1 Introduction
Poetry is personal expression, a verbal externalizing of the deeper world. It can untwist a vague idea, can capture a moment, it can express all ranges of human feelings and emotions. But it can also amuse, mock, satirize, annoy, reveal, rebel, protest, philosophize, dream and swim into the deep waters of subconscious (Symeonaki, 2013, 60). Students' attitudes and their role in language learning have been emphasized a lot in the literature. These attitudes may include attitudes towards the foreign language, the language teacher, the classroom, the speakers of the foreign language, or towards types of materials used for teaching the language. Poetry is one type of material which has been suggested by different authorities to be integrated with language teaching.
As a prelude to other parts of this study, this chapter will discuss the background upon which this study was initiated, the statement of problems that led to this study, the Aim and Objectives of the study. Others are Significance of the study, Scope of work, Research hypothesis and questions, Limitations of the Study and Definition of technical terms.
1.2 Background of Study
The term “literature” is a term of art which is known as imaginative writing in the sense of fiction-writing which is not literally true. Literature has also been described as a creative work of art, involving an aesthetic reordering of experience in order to communicate it morefully or accurately. Literature is any imaginative work of art that is written, sung, spoken or charted. That has a specific message and is conveyed in beautiful and woven language with the aim of entertainment. In other words, literature is concerned with beauty, invention and the creative use of language artistically designed to give pleasure and enjoyment while passing across message.
Literature is also seen as written works which are rendered as subject for study; they are drama, prose and poetry. In writing or study, we are going to concentrate on poetry. According to written words worth, poetry is the imaginative expression of strong feeling, usually rhythmically the spontaneous over flow of powerful feelings recollected in tranquility.
Poetry is a form of literature it is a record of the writers feelings about events which could be physical or otherwise. The subject of poetry could be supernatural (example J. P. Clark’s Abiku) or simply natural (example Lucys Poem). Poetry is a term that applies to many forms in which man expresses himself rhythmically. This is why poetry is a term of literary art that is easily distinguishable from prose by the predominance of rhythm. Rhythm is an integral part of nature and consequently existence, since everything in the world respond s to rhythm. Poetry is a special form of writing or composition involving in the use of imagination emotion and intellect in the communicate of experiments or in the interpretation of human consciousness and existence with unique structure and technical finesse.
Poetry is life because it deals with realities it has to do with man’s imagination feelings, his impression on and around him and the relationship between the world and himself it is the most personal in all aspects of literature. Poetry in more completed in the use of language than that of the prose because it is usually short and very direct to the point.
Poetry has beauty in its language and dignity in it’s compressed from. It is also unique in that if contributes to the stone of human experience and many facts of life. There are three main types of poetry, warmly, lyrical, poems are usually short and song like reflective lyric and descriptive lyric.
Narrative poems tell stories and examples are balled, epic, dramatic, monologue.
Dramatic poems tell their stories through the speech of their characters.
Examples epic, static poem criticize, ridicule and correct, for example ballads and sonnet. The study of poetry is training of the emotion and poetry aims at. Providing aesthetic satisfaction and shaping of individuals mind through critical appreciation. But despite this aim, poetry teaching and learning have created enormous problems of poetry teaching and learning is by a complete orientation, a revision of ideas and the general attitude towards poetry.
Therefore, in Nigeria where the research was carried out, the activities that was conducted is to Survey of Teachers and Students' Attitude towards the Teaching and Learning of Poetry in English.
1.3 Statement of Problems
Investigation revealed the problems of Teachers and Students' Attitude towards the Teaching and Learning of Poetry in English which entails that:
- Poetry teachers encounter problems in their teaching assignment because majority of the students are not well exposed
- Some of these problems of poetry teaching are caused by student’s linguistic incompetence.
- Advanced poems selected for students to study is one of the major problems affecting the teaching of poetry.
- Advanced poems encounter these problems because of their use of wrong methods.
- Student does not have interest in poetry because they find the language of poetry too difficult.
To these numerous problems, the study addressed itself and proffered suggestions to arresting these problems, inclusive of more effective methods of teaching awakening and sustaining students’ interest in poetry and generating a keener awareness of the dignity and beauty of poetry.
1.4 Aim and Objectives of Study
The aim of the study is to carry out a Survey of Teachers and Students' Attitude towards the Teaching and Learning of Poetry in English. In achieving this aim, the following specific objectives were laid out as follows:
- To investigate the problems affecting the teaching of poetry,
- To examine the challenges involved in teaching poetry,
- To examine the student’s attitude to poetry lessons, and
- To examine the teachers attitude towards the teaching of poetry in English class
1.5 Research Questions
The study came up with research questions so as to be able to ascertain the above stated objectives. The specific research questions for the study are stated below as follows:
- What are the problems affecting the teaching of poetry?
- What are the challenges involved in teaching poetry?
- What is the student’s attitude to poetry lessons?
- What is the teacher’s attitude towards the teaching of poetry in English class?
1.6 Research Hypothesis
In order to pursue the objective of this study, the following generalized statements have been designed to guide and aids in obtaining the result for the experiment to be conducted. For this work, the null hypothesis will be represented with H0 while the alternative hypothesis will be represented with hypothesis H1.
- H01: Students’ attitudes towards the value of the study of poetry will correlate significantly with their knowledge of poetry analysis.
- H02: Poetry teacher does not encounter problems in their teaching assignment because majority of them are not deeply exposed to poetry.
- H03: Advanced poetry selected for students to study is one not of the problems of poetry teaching.
- H04: Teachers of poetry do not encounter these problems because of their use of wrong method.
1.7 Significance of Study
This study will be of immense benefit to academic students and other researchers who intend to know more on this study and can also be used by non-researchers to build more on their research work. This study contributes to knowledge and could serve as a guide for other study.
1.8 Scope of Study
The scope of the research is focused on the Survey of Teachers and Students' Attitude towards the Teaching and Learning of Poetry in JSS English classes in Ikpoba Okha Local Government Area of Edo State.
1.9 Limitations of the Study
During the course of this study, many things militated against its completion, some of which are:
- Time Constraint: The time frame given to accomplish this project was very short due to school academic calendar and it was carried out under pressure which made the researcher not to implement some necessary features.
- Research material: availability of research material is a major setback to the scope of the study.
- Frequent power failure: This made the researcher append more money on fuel to ensure sustainable power.
- Financial Constraint: Insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature or information and in the process of data collection (internet, questionnaire and interview).
1.10 Definition of Terms
Poetry: Poetry is a form of literature it is a record of the writers feelings about events which could be physical or otherwise. Poetry is life because it deals with realities it has to do with man’s imagination feelings, his impression on and around him and the relationship between the world and himself it is the most personal in all aspects of literature.
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